The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency last month reached an out-of-court settlement with the Waterkeeper Alliance, National Resources Defense Council and Sierra Club regarding the regulation of pollution discharge from concentrated animal feeding operations, or CAFOs, into water that is protected by the Clean Water Act.

The Environmental Protection Agency, in a legal settlement that could affect the entire U.S. meat industry, has agreed to identify and investigate thousands of factory farms that have been avoiding government regulation for water pollution with animal waste.

Factory farms, also known as concentrated animal feeding operations, CAFO’s, confine animals on an industrial scale and produce massive amounts of manure and other waste. They apply liquid animal waste on land, which runs off into waterways, killing fish, spreading disease, and contaminating drinking water.

More than 30 years ago, Congress identified factory farms as water pollution sources to be regulated under the Clean Water Act’s permit program. But a Bush administration regulation allowed large facilities to bypass government regulation by claiming, without verification, that they do not discharge into waterways.

The settlement, which challenged the Bush administration loophole, requires the EPA to propose a rule on greater information gathering on CAFO’s within the next 12 months.

The E.P.A. reached a settlement this week with the Natural Resources Defense Council, Sierra Club, and Waterkeeper Alliance that would be a step towards closer monitoring of concentrated animal feeding operations, also known as factory farms.

There are thousands of CAFOs, but they have “historically many have been able to avoid pollution control requirements,” said John Devine, an attorney for the National Resources Defense Council.

The settlement requires the E.P.A. to propose a rule that will require CAFOs to report specific information on the amount of manure generated from the facilities and how this waste is handled.

The massive amount of animal waste that is produced from CAFOs can leach into the groundwater and into streams and rivers.

The White House emphasized a strong bilateral relationship with Karzai Tuesday, but Wednesday’s meeting was fraught with tension over the Afghan endgame strategy.

While Washington remains focused on completly removing the Taliban from Kandahar, Afghanistan and neighboring countries are on a path that ends the country’s eight-year conflict with negotiations for a settlement with the Taliban.

The local population is also ready to negotiate a Taliban settlement, a U.S. Military survey of public opinion in the Kandahar region showed. With a margin of 19 to 1, locals favored talks with the Taliban over continued fighting.

California’s Brown Opens Up the Monterey Shale Starting January 15 -
It has been a terrible year for environmentalists. Anti-environmental interests had huge wins in the Congressional midterms. State legislatures became even more entrenched. Republicans, who now control Congressional funding, will challenge relentlessly the EPA.
So if a line in the sand is to be drawn, it will be by the handful of politicians who control blue states. The most important of » read more

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Environment

On DCBureau are a story and timeline about the history of the Clean Water Act and the efforts to undermine it. Together they show an incremental, well-funded, organized campaign to weaken the law. On the 40th Anniversary of the Act, it is important to remember that environmental laws enjoyed bipartisan support for years. Weakening environmental regulations through the Congress and courts will have lasting, irreversible results.
Read in The New York » read more

National Security

As the United States still remains poised to launch an attack against Syria, it would be foolhardy for Americans to count on the Pentagon for information about that or any other military operation. The days of reporters being given full access to independently verify Pentagon activities are long over. Instead, the Department of Defense has embraced the idea that it can tell its own story without going through the national » read more